Fautso Becatti: The beautiful friction of photography
South African born photographer and hungryman director Fausto Becatti loves being on set but loves, even more, wandering the streets with a camera in hand. He talks to Izzy Ashton about the “deliberate” act of shooting on film, and being inspired by the friction of his surroundings.
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With a camera in his hand, Fausto Becatti feels free. Away from his job, the set or his team, “my favourite thing to do is just walk through a city with a camera,” he smiles, recalling trips with his girlfriend where he stopped to capture every little hidden corner.
“My favourite thing to do is just walk through a city with a camera.”
It’s this type of photography, the no-strings-attached, no-brief photography, that has allowed him to train his eye, now so coveted by brands and agencies alike. In fact, it was actually in between jobs that Becatti first picked up a camera: “I needed a creative outlet,” he says. He needed art for art’s sake rather than for a commercial end.
Above: A selection of some of Becatti's work.
The technicalities of film
Becatti has always been into the cinematography of capturing images. He remembers his friend’s mum letting them watch Pulp Fiction when they were very young, a movie which blew open his understanding of what could be captured on screen. He went to Cape Town University to study film, giving him a broad outlook on the medium as well as a differentiator from other directors. Studying stoked in him an obsession with the technical side of filmmaking.
“Photography helps you hone your eye in a way that maybe you wouldn’t if you were just directing performance.”
He talks with pride and passion about starting his career as a researcher, working alongside seven busy directors at once. He spent his days rushing between sets, “understanding both the people and the craft”. He believes it was this exhaustive, and exhausting, grounding in the industry that showed him who he could become; how to work successfully as a team and how to fight for an idea. He watched and he learned, and he grew.
Photography as training ground
At the start of his working and travelling life however, Becatti wasn’t into photography. He remembers a year-long trip around South America with regret that he only shot moving image, no stills. Now, he’s passionate about the partnership between the two mediums: “Photography helps you hone your eye in a way that maybe you wouldn’t if you were just directing performance.” It’s the training ground that allows you to learn, grow and develop your own style, your own way of working and your own taste, a point he returns to later in the conversation.
It’s photography that has made him a good partner to those he works with on set. He describes himself as “a DP’s best friend,” although admits at points this probably strays into “knowing too much” because he notices, and so worries about, every little detail in frame. “It [photography] has made me care more about framing and develop a visual eye that then goes into directing,” Becatti explains. Photography has taught him to look to the edges as well as the centre of the shot.
Above: Photographer and hungryman director Fausto Becatti.
The experience informs the shot
It’s this eye that Becatti carries with him into his brand work. He talks with pride about a film he shot for the VW Tiguan; “a good mix of performance and storytelling. The idea was really succinct and beautiful.” Likewise for a recent global campaign for audio brand Denon, Switch Life Back On, in which every shot feels like it could’ve been a beautiful still.
Becatti believes that everything done before - in life, at work or at home - is brought into each image or film. It’s the experience that informs the visuals we end up seeing, whether that’s what the director themself brings or whether it’s the actual experience of being on set.
Becatti believes that everything done before - in life, at work or at home - is brought into each image or film.
And he loves being on set. The micro-climate it creates, the energy and shared ambition. Everything that happens there - the conversations, the problems solved - all of it, he explains, “goes into the screen.” He uses the Apocalypse Now set as an example, a film which was made over two hundred and thirty-eight days of production: “You feel it. You don’t know why, but it’s in those frames.”
Above: One of Becatti's favourite images, Los Sauces.
Film vs digital
Becatti is particularly passionate about the difference between shooting on film or with digital - “if I have my digital camera, I don’t feel as inspired”. Remarking on what a commercial set feels like when shooting on film, he says, “The focus of that set versus a digital set, it’s chalk and cheese. And it’s so beautiful when everyone understands that… I love that intentional feeling on both sides.”
“If I have my digital camera, I don’t feel as inspired.”
For Becatti, shooting on film is a “deliberate” act. When you’re limited in your shots, he adds, “each one feels like magic.” He’s in the process of pulling the last five years of his photography into an exhibition, something he seems to find both satisfying and clarifying. He has, amazingly, managed to get his selection down to just ten photos although, when pushed, he does admit that the selection is being “constantly edited”.
When asked if he has a favourite shot, Becatti talks about a trip he did to Mexico. Driving along the road, through “a weird part of town”, something made him pull the car over. He raised his camera, clicked the shutter then got back into the car. It was only when he got home and developed the film that Becatti realised he had something special [image above].
Above: More of Becatti's work.
Travel as much as possible
Born and raised in South Africa, Becatti has spent his life travelling the world. “I travel as much as possible,” he says. He recently moved to New York - “I’m in heaven!” - and talks about how important it was to him to live in the “grittier part of town.” He explains, “I’m interested in the friction of a place.” The texture, the landscape and the weird and wonderful stories that the city hides and the subway - “the great equaliser” - reveals.
“These little cinematic, human moments,” as he calls them, are what Becatti is determined to capture. It’s always the humans that Becatti is most interested in when it comes to photography. He loves shooting people, usually “somebody a bit isolated in the city,” ideally without them noticing, and adds that most people don’t mind.
“These little cinematic, human moments,” as he calls them, are what Becatti is determined to capture.
He’s thoughtful when he talks about the challenge of shooting people, strangers really, in the street. “I think I’ve got less brave,” he says, when it comes to getting in people’s faces and getting the shot. He talks with awe of the American street photographer Bruce Gilden, probably one of the best known for getting in people’s faces, flash in hand: “he’s the boldest of all.”
Taste sets you apart
Along with his style, there is another element that Becatti believes is almost as key to a photographer or director making a name for themselves: namely, their taste. “If you have a voice and a vision and taste and style,” he says, “and it’s distinct enough, I think you’ll be fine.”
The most important thing a creative individual can do, he feels, is to find and build their voice so that people buy into them and their taste. That way, people will want to collaborate because of an artist’s taste, not in spite of it. And when it comes to Becatti’s parting words? He defers to a footnote on his website, revealing his optimism for the creative industries and for creatives’ futures: “Everything is gonna be OK. Trust me.”
